


Feral

by cosmopoeicpower



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Super Dangan Ronpa 2
Genre: 'okay google how to write about animal instincts without it sounding... Weird', Alternate Universe - Different Motives (Dangan Ronpa), Animal Traits, Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, It's a danganronpa fic of a motive what do you expect, Sfw Furry, The motive is they all turn into furries.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-09-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:20:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 16,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26184847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cosmopoeicpower/pseuds/cosmopoeicpower
Summary: Ever seen Beastars or Zootopia? Yeah. That's what's going on. Hajime is having a bad time.The warning does not apply until chapter 6, arguably chapter 5.
Comments: 18
Kudos: 79





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is exceedingly self indulgent, but I felt like [my art on tumblr](https://irilumina.tumblr.com/tagged/furry-au) wasn't conveying exactly what happens in the au, so I decided to write it out!

The first thing Hajime noticed when he awoke that morning was that he was warm. Exceedingly warm. Pulling the covers off of him, and slinging his legs over the side of the bed, he ran a hand through his hair. Strangely, his hand seemed to catch on something. 

‘ _What is that?_ ’ he asked, trying to pull the thing off of his head. However, the only thing he got was a jab of pain. “Ow!” Whatever was attached to his head wasn’t coming off.‘ _Something’s not right here._ ’ 

Standing up, he immediately stumbled, grabbing the bedpost for support. Hajime looked down, and his eyes widened.

‘ _Are those… paws? What the hell is going on here?_ ’ Hajime wasted no time rushing over to the bathroom mirror, and jumped back in shock, letting out a yelp.

“Holy shit…” 

He had turned into some kind of wolf-man. His hands now had claws, and his face sported a muzzle that was currently left hanging open out of sheer confusion and worry. It seemed like his normal hair still remained, but his body now sported the same color fur across his entire body. Twisting around, he caught sight of a bushy tail.

“What the fuck happened to me?!” he shouted, and after a bit more stumbling on his new legs, he threw the door of his cottage open. He was immediately greeted with a scream, and turned to see a small yellow tiger running towards him. Said tiger was incredibly short, and wore a suit. “Fuyuhiko?!”

“Hajime, what the fuck is going on?! Why am I some kind of cat person?! Why do you look like that?!” Fuyuhiko shouted, hands- paws? - clenched in frustration. “Whoever did this is a fucking freak!”

Hajime took a deep breath, a little shocked at the massive fangs his friend was now sporting. “Okay, hold on. Let’s calm down and think about this-” 

Calming down was not an option it seemed, as more shrieks and screams erupted from the various cottages around them. A skunk bolted out past a cottage, pink fur standing on end like a frightened cat, screeching absolute nonsense, while a massive boar chased a hyena behind him. Further down, a mouse began running towards them.

“H-Hajime?! F-F-Fuyuhiko?! What is happening? Why-” Mikan cut herself off by tripping over her long mouse tail, stumbling and crashing to the boardwalk. Hajime and Fuyuhiko quickly helped her up, and she gripped her hair in anxiety. “Why a-am I a m-m-mouse?!”

“This has got to be that stupid bear’s latest weird idea,” Fuyuhiko griped, picking his own fur off of his suit.

“I-I don’t want to be a m-mouse! Do you know the k-k-kinds of diseases mice can carry? I could carry the B-Bubonic Plague! Maybe that’s the new motive, having me c-contaminate everyone with a deadly d-disease. Don’t t-touch me, Hajime or Fuyuh-hiko, I could accidentally hurt you-”

“Mikan, listen to me,” Hajime said, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Deep breaths, okay? Go grab some other people, and head up to the restaurant. We need to figure out what’s going on together.” 

Mikan nodded nervously, gripping her mouse tail in her hands to keep it out of the way, before turning around to find the people who ran by earlier. 

Fuyuhiko ran a hand through his short hair. “You’ve got a point. Gathering everyone together is the most important thing right now. I’ll… go check on some of the others. This is just too weird…”

‘ _I couldn’t agree more,_ ’ Hajime thought, waving Fuyuhiko off, before heading to the nearest cottage, which happened to be Chiaki’s. ‘ _I need a level-headed person right now. Let’s try Chiaki._ ’

Knocking on her door, Hajime was surprised to be greeted by two large ears. Peering down, he saw a pink bunny, and briefly wondered if this was actually Monomi before hearing a tired “Good morning, Hajime.”

Hajime smiled uneasily. “You… know what happened to you, right?” he asked. Chiaki looked up at him, briefly surprised to see a wolf, before nodding, rubbing her eye. Her massive ears only made her look even shorter than she already was.

“Yeah, I was fine until I realized I can’t play PC games anymore with these hands,” she muttered sadly. Hajime balked. 

“That’s… that’s the thing you’re worried about, huh?”

Chiaki sighed, flexing her hands. “Yeah, but I can live with just my handheld, I think. That’s not the important thing right now, though, is it?” she muttered, slipping her console into her pocket. “I think with these ears, I was able to hear you three talking outside of my cottage. Do you want me to come with you?”

“You were able to hear us?” Hajime asked, eyes wide. “That’s impressive. I guess it makes sense that these aren’t just cosmetic changes.” He thought for a moment. “Yeah, come with me for whoever’s left. It’s only been a few minutes, but the chaos has me going crazy.” Hajime let out a huff. The two left her cottage, and checked their pads to see who hadn’t arrived at the restaurant yet. 

Ah.

Nagito.

“Come on,” Chiaki said, pulling at his arm. “It’ll be fine, Hajime.” Sighing, Hajime let her pull him along.

‘ _How in the world is he going to be taking this?_ ’ Hajime thought to himself. Probably something about how ‘this whole situation is actually brimming with hope!’ or whatever. As they crossed back over to Hajime’s section of cottages, they caught a glimpse of a few more people heading up into the restaurant, and Fuyuhiko turned around to wave at them. Throwing a wave back, they approached Nagito’s cottage. Hajime hesitated to knock, so Chiaki went up instead.

Before either could actually do anything, the door swung open suddenly. Obviously, Nagito was not immune to whatever was going on, but it still surprised him each time he spotted someone new. He seemed to be some kind of white fox, and his ears, unlike Chiaki’s, seemed to add on another couple inches to him. That smile that could only be described as ‘aggressively passive’ somehow remained on his face despite the muzzle.

“Oh! Sorry Chiaki, Hajime, I was just leaving to figure out what was going on! When I woke up, I looked like this! It was terrible, I fell a couple of times tripping over this tail. I thought it was just another stroke of awful luck, or that perhaps I had been reduced to nothing more than a mere animal while surrounded by such talented humans, but I guess everyone looks like this now! Though, perhaps it’s that my luck has begun to affect everyone else on the island.”

“It’s most likely the new motive… I think,” Chiaki said, ignoring his entire rant. “We’re gathering everyone at the restaurant to figure out what’s happening.”

It was easy enough to follow Chiaki and Nagito towards the hotel at the back of the resort. Trying as hard as he could, he couldn’t stop himself from watching Chiaki’s tall rabbit ears bounce as she walked, her eyes glued to her game. Nagito’s tail swayed as he walked, and Hajime still found himself stumbling every now and again, unused to his legs.

Climbing up the stairs leading to the restaurant, the three of them could hear a cacophony of screams and confused yelling. Entering, Hajime immediately ducked to the ground to avoid being kicked by Akane. It seemed that Akane- wait was she the hyena from earlier?- and Nekomaru- now a gigantic boar- had begun duking it out. Mikan lay crying on the floor, seeming to have tripped over her tail as a crazy looking dog that had to be Ibuki fawned over her, and Hiyoko, a deer, laughed. Fuyuhiko was shouting at Kazuichi over something, and Sonia- some kind of fancy toy dog breed- was bent over a table, covering something with her hands. 

“Use your new abilities to strike me down! Give it everything you’ve got!!”

Akane laughed like the hyena she was, grinning and showing her new sharp teeth. “I haven’t even gotten started yet!”

“This is incredible,” Hajime heard Nagito mutter, his eyes wide watching the two fight. “The power that these new forms hold could bring out everyone’s talents even more! I can’t wait to see what happens next!”

“Hit me with your best shot, Nekomaru!”

“Hold on.”

Akane stopped mid-punch, and turned to Chiaki, who was standing off to the side. Hajime wondered how she managed to dodge around Akane and Nekomaru with all the chaos.

“Let’s hold off on improving anyone’s abilities until we figure out what’s going on. Is everyone here?” 

The group looked around at each other, Despite the changes to everyone’s appearances, they still managed to get a head count.

“I think that’s everyone,” Hajime muttered, before his ears shot up in realization. “Wait a second, where’s Gundham?!” Everyone looked around frantically.

“Is he already dead?!” Kazuichi shrieked. 

“O-oh dear Gundham’s dead! Oh no-”

“Everyone stop!” Sonia shouted, walking into the center of the group. “Gundham is fine! He has been here the entire time!” She held her hands out, and in the palm of her hand sat a tiny hamster. Said hamster began cackling loudly.

“Foolish beasts! I have become something more powerful than all of you!” he yelled, wrapping his tiny scarf around his shoulders tighter.

Hajime leaned down over him, eyebrows furrowed in concern. “Gundham..? Why are you… so small?”

“Because clearly my dark powers have realized my potential, and have graced me with the terrifying form of the Fifth Dark Deva of Destruction! Written in the legends, there was said to be a lost Deva, cast down to hell for being too powerful!” 

Sonia stared down at him, eyes glittering. “That’s incredible, Gundham! Now, you will be able to conquer the world alongside your Dark Devas of Destruction!” 

Kazuichi grumbled. “Seriously, though, why is he so damn small? Mikan’s a mouse, and she’s still her normal height.”

“Because it’s funny, why else?!” Monokuma laughed. Hajime lept back, yelping in a way he felt sounded too canine.

“You bastard, what the fuck did you do to us?!” Fuyuhiko growled, pointing a clawed finger out at Monokuma.

“Why, it’s the new motive, obviously! Did you seriously not get that until now? Boy, kids these days sure are dense.”

“So if this is the new motive, how is this supposed to make us kill each other?” Nagito spoke up, leaning against one of the columns. “This doesn’t seem like a decent way to force a murder.”

Monokuma giggled. “Ever seen the movie with the furries in the giant city?”

“Oh you mean zooto-”

“Copyright! We can’t say that! Anyways, humans have the instinctual drive for survival, and that can cause them to act in crazy ways. But animals, wowie! Animals are driven solely by the desire to eat and live as long as possible! Several of you are currently experiencing what it’s like to be an apex predator! Isn’t that incredible? Bears are still the best one though, if you ask me.”

Fuyuhiko rolled his eyes. “Well, nobody did ask you, did they?”

“Instead of thinking up comebacks, I think I’d be much more worried about how your instincts could begin to affect you! Especially the predators here. Well… good luck!” 

And with that, he was gone. 

Hajime glanced around the room, watching his fellow classmates all eye each other warily. 

‘ _Instincts? What is he planning?_ ’ Hajime thought. 

“What the hell are we gonna do?” Kazuichi groaned, gripping his beanie and pulling it down over his face, leaning over onto the table. 

“I’m gonna use these claws to kick Coach’s ass!” Akane yelled, slapping Nekomaru on the back. “Plus, we got food every mornin’ in the restaurant. Why would we wanna eat each other?”

“Don’t say that so loud!” Kazuichi shouted. “He’ll hear you and take away our food!”

“If that gross bear told the truth, I’m not staying anywhere near anyone with fangs!” Hiyoko yelled, getting up to leave the restaurant. “I am not becoming a victim of cannibalism!”

“Hiyoko wait!” Hajime called after her, but to no avail. She was already gone. 

“M-maybe she h-has a point?” Mikan mumbled from the floor. “While I disagree on it being c-cannibalism, considering we all a-appear to be different species, i-if everyone is going to end up acting like animals, i-it could be best to just… stay away from p-predators!”

“What if he was lying?” Ibuki asked, waving her hand in the air frantically. “Cause… Ibuki doesn’t even feel hungry right now! Especially not for a cute mouse like Mikan or an adorable bunny like Chiaki!”

Hajime put a hand to his… chin- muzzle?- in thought. “He could have been lying to us, that’s true.”

Fuyuhiko scratched behind his ears with his claws. “What an asshole! He’s trying to separate us from each other! I say we don’t divide up. Let’s prove to that prick that we’re more than a bunch of fucking animals!”

“I agree,” Chiaki perked up. “Until we start seeing signs that what Monokuma even said is true, I see no reason to split everyone up. Plus, we’re all friends right? Let’s stick together.” 

Hajime relaxed a bit at Chiaki’s faith in everyone. They were done with these murders, right? There was no way some insane idea like turning everyone into animals would force everyone to turn on each other… right?

“We’ll show him!!” shouted Nekomaru.

“Ibuki’s getting some crazy inspiration right now! A song is needing to be written about this! ‘Despite my claws and fangs, I’m a human underneath it all!!’”

“T-that sounds like a w-wonderful song!”

Nagito giggled. “This is going to be so exciting! I can’t wait.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The mandatory conversation where Komaeda is excited about the motive and Hajime is confused.

The walk back to his cottage almost seemed normal. He heard his friends laughing with each other by the pool, but turning to look he was still shocked to see a neon colored dog and a Pomeranian holding a hamster. It was incredible that Gundham’s voice managed to carry all the way across the pool, considering how small he was now.

Shutting the door to his cottage, Hajime made his way into the bathroom. Staring at himself in the mirror, he hardly recognized himself. His eyes stared back at him, and he knew it was himself in that mirror. But the phrase ‘knowing it like the back of your hand’ didn’t exactly apply anymore with the fur and… claws. 

“Do I really have the capacity to kill someone with these?” he muttered to himself, flexing his hand back and forth. 

‘ _How does he even have the power to change everyone like this? That kind of power… I don’t want to think about what else he can do_.’

Hajime balled his hands into fists, staring directly at his own reflection. “I’m not going to let him tear us apart like this.”

With that, he stepped out of the cottage, the noon sun shining down like it always did. He started walking away from the resort, not really caring where his feet carried him. Everyone he walked past, he waved a hand at them in as friendly of a manner as he could. He stopped for a bit to watch Akane and Nekomaru fight each other in the Rocketpunch parking lot. 

Eventually, his feet led him to the beach. Walking along the water, he turned to see instead of shoeprints, he left pawprints in his wake. He felt the ocean breeze blowing the fur on his entire body, and not just his hair like usual. The smell of the beach was so much stronger with his new nose. He could smell the ocean salt, the bark of the palm trees, even… wait, what?

Hajime put his nose to the air, trying to figure out what the new scent was. Turning around, he bumped into someone, and he let out a yell, eyes shooting open. 

“Hello Hajime!”

Hajime groaned, leaning over and bracing himself against his thighs, catching his breath. “Fuck, Nagito, you scared the shit out of me!”

Nagito chuckled. “Ah, I apologize Hajime! All I wanted was to come down here and talk to you, but clearly I’m just too quiet that I frightened you. Perhaps these paws are quieter than human feet, and now my steps are near silent, which is quite unfortunate because now I’ve scared you.”

“It-it’s fine,” Hajime sighed. “What do you want?”

Nagito extended his arms outwards, stretching. “Hajime, do you believe what Monokuma said?”

Hajime stared at him. “What do you mean?”

“About the predators being driven to kill? The instincts of the animals everyone’s become?” Nagito looked at him, smiling like always. Hajime furrowed his brow. He had a feeling that this conversation was going to spiral, but decided to humor him anyways.

“Even if what he said was true, I’m not going to become some- some feral animal!” Hajime growled; he couldn’t help getting riled up. Suddenly, Nagito was right up next to him, staring at him closely. “W-what are you doing?”

“Wow,” Nagito mumbled, eyes wide. “Your teeth are so sharp now! As expected of someone like you, Hajime! They look like they could really tear into something! Open your mouth more!” Hajime leaned back and Nagito’s claws attempted to make their way inside his mouth to prod at his fangs.

“Knock it off, I’m not gonna let you… stick your hands in my mouth!” Hajime yelled. He took a few steps back, wiping his mouth. Hajime saw Nagito’s ears flatten against his head, but his smile still remained. “A-ah, I apologize, Hajime! That was… uncalled for. I wouldn’t want to somehow infect you with some kind of disease. I could even be rabid!” Hajime realized that Nagito’s ears betrayed his emotions. ‘ _He’s trying to brush it off like it’s nothing, but his ears flattened and his tail dropped. Interesting. It seems like when one of us tries to hide something, our body language still gives some of it away._ ’

“It’s a shame, though.”

Hajime returned his attention to whatever Nagito was about to ramble about. “What is?”

Nagito sighed, running a hand through his hair, his ears drooping. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to help out the killer this time. Before, everyone locked me in the old building, so I was hoping that perhaps for this motive, I would have the chance to finally act as a stepping stone for one of the amazing Ultimates here, but I can’t quite figure out how to use this canine body as a tool.” He paused his rambling to stare out at the ocean, and Hajime realized that the noon sun had begun dipping down towards the sea. The night time Monokuma announcement would sound off in a couple of hours. Had time really passed that quickly?

How was he even supposed to respond to that? “Don’t- don’t even think about something like that!” Nagito’s ears perked up, eyes staring at him, and Hajime remembered that he wasn’t the only one considered a predator here. “We’re not going to succumb to some weird… craving for violence! We’re not animals, we’re people!”

“But haven’t you already begun feeling it too, Hajime?” Nagito had dropped his smile. Hajime’s ears flicked back.

“Feel what?”

“Aren’t you already getting hungry? The desire to hunt is in your DNA now, Hajime. Think about it.”

Hajime did think about it. He felt a prickling at the back of his head. It was… restless. Feral. Hungry. His eyes widened at the realization. ‘ _Is he trying to make me kill someone?! I just told him I wasn’t going to fall for it!_ ’ Hajime shook his head harshly to get the feelings out. Nagito grinned, his fangs glowing orange from the sunset.

“It has begun to set in, hasn’t it?”

The sun cast a fiery glow onto the water, bouncing orange light up onto them. It turned Nagito’s now entirely white body into a walking fire. 

“Stop putting all of this shit into my head! I don’t know why I even decided to humor this conversation. You’re not getting me to kill someone with my own hands!”

With that, Hajime turned and trudged away from the grinning fox behind him. He had felt something in the back of his mind ever since this morning, but now that Nagito had brought it up, the thoughts wouldn’t go away. 

He shut his cottage door extra hard, hoping it would scare whatever creature was lurking in his mind enough for it to stop pleading for violence in his ear. He flopped down onto his bed, and stared at the sheer canopy above him. His hands covered his eyes, claws gripping at his forehead, and though he wanted to let out a sigh, a distinctly canine whimper came from his throat instead. 

“This feels like a fucking fever dream,” he muttered to himself. Soon enough, sleep came to him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I find it so funny that so far, Komaeda's rambling is like 10% of the entire fic. He really just talks and nobody stops him, huh? You have no idea how much I wish this fic could have some kind of ship in it (either komahina or hinanami im game either way), but... as big of a furry as I am, I don't want to write furries being romantic with each other. It's a lil' too weird for me.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things are starting to heat up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> @ everyone saying 'oh haha but i'm not a furry though *sweats*' you are now
> 
> but also: I'm having a super fun time posting this! I never thought my first fic would be a furry au, but here we are! I really enjoy writing all of the characters in this game.

The next morning, Hajime awoke to an intense feeling of hunger. It forced him out of bed and out the door, nearly forgetting his tie. 

‘ _I_ _know I haven’t eaten anything since yesterday, but this level of hunger is ridiculous._ ’

Hajime didn’t know why he thought this morning would be less chaotic than yesterday’s. While certainly, most of the group seemed to be eating breakfast like normal, Kazuichi was whining into the table, his big bushy skunk tail flopped limply on the floor, and Hiyoko was nowhere to be seen. Gundham was walking back and forth across the table when Hajime sat down next to Fuyuhiko and Chiaki, and locked onto Hajime’s food, slapping a muffin off of his plate.

“What the- Gundham what the hell?!” Hajime growled. Gundham’s tiny hamster arms pointed dramatically up at him.

“Hellhound beast! Think before consuming a deadly poison! Do you not know the signs of your own demise?!”

Hajime’s ears dropped to his head. “Are you saying someone poisoned my food?! How is that even possible?”

Kazuichi picked his head up from the table. “He said the same thing about my food! I was just going along like normal, trying to eat my omelet, and he jumped onto my fork and made me drop it! What the hell, man?! What if I accidentally ate you instead of my omelet?! You’re just being mean!"

Gundham shook his head, waddling over to the accused muffin. “That is not quite true. Take a closer look, foul beasts, and all will be revealed.”

Fuyuhiko snatched it up, turning it around in his hands. “It’s just a normal chocolate chip muffin, I don’t see the issue here.”

“And my omelet is fine! It’s just how I usually get it! I put in peppers, cheese, and onions!”

“And that is why you nearly met your end!”

Hajime snorted in frustration. “Just say what you mean, Gundham. I can’t pick up what you’re saying with your gimmick.” He watched as Gundham scurried back over to Sonia, who lifted him up in her hands. 

“While it is truly a great gift to be blessed with the powers of the animal kingdom, these powers come with a price. There are certain limits to what these bodies can consume. It is deadly toxic for skunks to eat onions, and much like the queen of darkness who holds me, you, Hajime Hinata, cannot consume anything containing the cocoa bean.”

Sonia nodded, her fluffy fur bouncing as she did so. “It is true! I was about to consume some of my treasured Novoselic chocolates, when Gundham bit into the hand holding said chocolate!”

Kazuichi glared at the tiny ball of fur in Sonia’s hands. “Gundham why would you bite Miss Sonia?! You could have injured her soft hands!”

“No, Kazuichi!” Sonia barked at him. ‘ _What type of toy dog breed is she anyway?_ ’ “He saved my life! After he told me why he bit me, I thanked him profusely for his valiant effort to protect me!” She pressed her nose against his little head as a makeshift kiss. “Were it not for him, I would be dead!”

Chiaki looked up from gaming, and Hajime wondered if she could play games and eat simultaneously. “Is there anything I need to avoid then, Gundham?”

“An excellent question! In fact, we should be careful to remove all traces of onion, garlic, avocado, and chocolate from our plates!”

Ibuki perked up from her spot at the other end of the table. “No garlic?! This really is a motive for murder!”

‘ _I-I don’t think not having garlic in our food is enough for someone to kill another person!_ ’

Hajime heard a loud slapping noise, and turned to see Akane leaning over on the table like Kazuichi had been, whining like an animal. Nekomaru patted her on the back loudly again, and Hajime realized that was his way of comforting her. “I’ve eaten all this food, but I’m still hungryyyyyy!”

Fuyuhiko balked. “H-how the fuck is that possible?! You ate both your plate and Nekomaru’s!”

“I dunno, okay? It’s just… I keep smellin’ something and it’s making me seriously hungry!”

“Akane, could you describe what the scent is?” Nagito asked, staring at her with eyes that intended casualness, though his perked ears and swishing tail betrayed his facade. Hajime began feeling uneasy.

Akane put her hand to her chin, scratching at the fur there. “Hmmmmm… It’s like… I dunno, like an animal? Like there’s some real’ good food right under my nose, but I just can’t find it!”

“Now that you mention it,” Fuyuhiko muttered. “I’ve been smelling something like that ever since yesterday.”

Nagito’s eyes widened. “How odd! Has anyone else been experiencing such sensations?” The group looked around at each other.

“Oh! Oh!” Ibuki leaned in towards everyone at the table. “I’ve been feeling craazzzy hungry too! I thought I was just going through some kind of furry puberty!”

‘ _What are you even talking about?_ ’

“Nah, I haven’t felt that hunger you guys are talkin’ about, ” Kazuichi said, stabbing his food with his fork. “But I’ve been feelin’ really scared all morning! Stupid feeling wont go away no matter what I do!”

“I-it’s the same for me too!” Mikan spoke up.

“The All-Seeing Eye reveals the truth,” Gundham said, and Sonia leaned over to stare at him.

“What has it revealed, Gundham?”

The tiny hamster threw his arms to the sky. “This is exactly what the bear from hell was warning us about!”

“Hmm…” Chiaki had set her console down on the table, and put a hand to her chin in thought. “The fear that Kazuichi and Mikan are feeling… and the hunger that Fuyuhiko, Akane, and Ibuki are feeling… this must be the instincts that Monokuma was talking about. The people who have become predators are most likely being drawn towards the people who have become prey, I think.”

“Instincts, huh…” Hajime muttered, “When I woke up this morning, I felt so hungry that I nearly forgot to put my tie on. Is that the same kind of hunger as you all?” 

They nodded. 

“This is great!” Nagito beamed.

“This is the opposite of great, you fucking weirdo!” Fuyuhiko snapped at him. “What if we start wanting to eat each other?!”

“This is quite the test for everyone to endure.” Nagito sounded like he was talking to himself. “But I’m sure that for Ultimates like yourselves, this will be something that will push everyone towards becoming symbols of hope!”

“This isn’t hope! This is madness!” Kazuichi cried out. “I-I don’t want to be eaten by anyone! Hiyoko was right, being surrounded by predators is basically suicide!” With that, Kazuichi stood up, and backed away from the table everyone sat at. “That’s it! Everyone who’s a prey animal, stick with me! It’s dangerous to be around them!”

“Kazuichi, you’re being ridiculous!” Hajime yelled, growling. Kazuichi cowered.

“See? Look at his fangs! He’s clearly just waiting to get alone with one of us, and sink them into our necks!”

“That doesn’t sound like a wolf, that sounds like a vampire,” Fuyuhiko grumbled. Kazuichi pointed a finger at him.

“You’re even scarier than Hajime is! Tigers are like… the king of the jungle or whatever, right?”

Nekomaru laughed loudly. “I’m not scared of a little cat like him! Why would I abandon people in a crisis like this? That’s not what a team manager does! If you want to cower away in a corner, go ahead! But I’m not gonna join you!”

Mikan held her tail in her hands, gripping it tightly. “I think i-it’s a good idea.”

Hajime stared at her, and Mikan jumped. “I-if everyone is turning against each other… It’s like Hiyoko said yesterday, r-right? If all of you are feeling a need to k-kill us… I th-think it’s smart to stay away from you… for safety reasons o-of course!” Mikan stood up from her chair, stumbling a little, causing everyone to worry for a brief moment that she’d fall again. “I’m coming with you, Kazuichi!”

Kazuichi scratched the back of his neck. “Thank goodness, I was worried nobody was gonna join me! Then I’d look like an idiot!”

“You already are an idiot,” Hajime griped, rolling his eyes.

“Shut up, predator!! That’s it, I’m outta here! C’mon Mikan, and anyone else who wants to live!” 

With that, Kazuichi stomped down the stairs, Mikan skittering off after him. The table was silent for a moment. Were they really slowly devolving into hungry animals? They had food in front of them, so why were they all still hungry? Sonia stood.

“No more sad faces! We’re sticking together, and that’s that!” she announced, Gundham laughing maniacally from her shoulder. 

Everyone went about their day from that point on. Akane seemed a bit more sluggish than usual, but she was always craving food even when she was fully human. After spending most of his afternoon at the Monomono Machine- something nobody needed to know, Hajime made his way into the lobby of the hotel, and found Chiaki grumbling as she played the arcade machine in the back corner.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. She didn’t take her eyes away from the screen until she died again. 

“I can’t play with these small paw hands,” she said, frowning. Hajime thought this was one of the first times he’d seen her annoyed outside of a class trial. “I know exactly how to move my hands to get the combos I need, normally, but now with these stupid little paws, my timings are all off.”

Hajime couldn’t help but laugh. “Hey maybe we’ll be on even footing now? We can play a round, and maybe you’ll see what it’s like for me to play against you.”

She smiled at that, and the two tried to play a couple of rounds. Hajime saw what she was talking about; every time he tried to pull off a complicated move, his claws caught on something, and he still ended up losing both times. 

“Okay, so maybe it also messed with my gaming abilities just as much as it messed with yours,” he said. 

Chiaki sighed. “Now what am I supposed to do? I always come here during the day to play the arcade machines, but I can’t even get past level 87 on the other machine.”

“L-level 87 is still ridiculously high though!”

Chiaki put a finger up. “But it’s not beating the whole game. I’ve tried four times already.”

“Four times since we changed?!”

“No, four times today.”

“Today alone?!”

His shock caused her to start laughing, and soon Hajime found himself joining in. Hajime noticed that when she laughed, her little bunny nose scrunched up. Chiaki was always someone he felt relaxed around, even when crazy stuff like them turning into animals happened.

“You know,” Hajime said, wiping a tear from his eye and smiling, “I’m really glad you didn’t buy into Kazuichi and Mikan’s paranoia.” Realizing there was no sense in trying to play games they were both terrible at, they stepped outside to sit on the front stairs. An evening breeze felt nice when you were covered in warm fur. Chiaki pulled her legs up to her chest, leaning her head against her knees.

“I… don’t like the idea of everyone being scared of each other,” she said, staring out at the pool, watching as the stars began to reflect in its still waters. Hajime watched her ears flop down on either side of her head. Rabbits sure were small…“The paranoia is caused by Monokuma, and I can’t stand to watch my friends point fingers at each other, when we need to be pointing at him.”

“I’m sure it’s just Kazuichi being his usual self, and things will go back to normal once this is over.” Hajime was half-paying attention, he was instead watching her nose twitch as she spoke.

“It won’t be, though.”

Hajime looked at her. “What do you mean?”

She sighed. “It’s not gonna be over until someone dies. That’s how his motives work. We’re gonna be stuck like this for the foreseeable future, so… I dunno if Kazuichi’s paranoia is gonna let up.” She picked her head up, meeting Hajime’s eyes. “I think it’s gonna only get worse from here. Even you’re starting to feel the effects.”

“What makes you say that?”

She leaned towards him, and wiped her hand against his chin. “You’re drooling, did you not notice?”

His eyes widened. “I-wh- I’m what?” He swiped his arm against his mouth, and it was true. “No, I-I didn’t realize I was doing that.” ‘ _What the hell is wrong is with me?!_ ’

Chiaki smiled sadly at him. “I think your body thinks I’m prey.” That made Hajime stand, walking down the steps away from her. 

“T-then I should get away from you. I don’t want to hurt you, Chiaki!” His body was reacting on it’s own? Could he even stop himself from trying to kill his classmates? Hajime now noticed his fangs and claws and incredible hearing more and more. This was the body of a killer-

“Hajime.”

He looked over at her. She stood up, and walked towards him. “You’re not gonna hurt me. You wouldn’t do something like that.” She reached up, and held his face in her hands, which sunk into the fur of his face.

“How do you know that? Clearly my body wants to kill and eat you! That’s- that’s so messed up!” Her hands rubbed little circles into the fur on his muzzle. 

“I know because you’re my friend. No matter what happens, I know you’re not going to hurt me, Hajime.”

He sighed in her hands. She was right. He would never want to hurt her. Taking a deep breath, he removed her hands from his face. “Okay.”

“You good?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he sighed again, calmer. “I’m good.”

Chiaki hugged him, and Hajime let out a small chuckle as her large ears nearly whacked his head. He carefully returned her hug, trying not to hurt her with his sharp claws.

‘ _I’m not going to hurt her. I’m not going to hurt anybody here, and I won’t let anyone else do so._ ’


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You know what they say "calm before the etc etc etc"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love Ibuki so much

The fact that Hajime was starting to grow used to everyone’s new forms was a bit concerning to him. The group had begun to dwindle, now that three of them had separated out of fear, but those who remained were continuing life as normal… well, as normal as they could. Hajime spotted Sonia covered in hamsters, with Gundham sitting on her shoulder once more. They seemed to be practicing some kind of maneuver, and it ended with Gundham high-fiving one of his hamsters. 

But no matter how normal everything seemed, he couldn’t shake the constant pestering in the back of his mind. He was _restless_. It was fine when he hung out with Fuyuhiko or Ibuki, but every time he went around Chiaki or Sonia and Gundham, it crawled into his brain like a parasite. 

He was shocked out of his thoughts by Ibuki jumping onto his back, causing him to yelp, and nearly crash into the asphalt of the diner’s parking lot. 

“Hajimeee!! Quit spending so much time by yourself, otherwise I’ll have to call you a lone wolf, and that joke sucks!” She laughed, her large pierced ears pulled back in excitement. 

“I-I’m not a lone wolf!” He fired back. Ibuki’s grin remained, and Hajime knew nothing would deter her mission to cheer him up. 

“But you _are_ a wolf, right?” she asked. 

“Yeah?” Where was this going?

“Then you’ve totally gotta show off your howl!!”

Hajime stared at her incredulously. “You want me to howl? Why would I do that?”

Ibuki threw her hands up in the air, her tail wagging like crazy. “I wanna see if I’ll join in!” She ran in a little circle around him. “I’m a wolf too!”

At that, Hajime balked. “You’re what?! How are you a wolf when you look like that?!” Ibuki had very tall ears, and her fur was a cacophony of colors, ranging from blue to purple to pink. He knew that everyone’s colors were slightly different to match their normal hair colors, but there was no way Ibuki was a wolf!

“I’m a half wolf half dog half shark! This is what my fursona looked like when I was a kid, and she was definitely part wolf!”

“Then why don’t you howl?!” Hajime barked at her, ignoring the fact that she was definitely not also part shark. Ibuki groaned, shoulders slumping and head falling backwards. 

“Cause I can’t figure out how yet! Maybe the shark part in me is keeping me from being to howl like a full wolf.”

It seemed like there was no getting around it. Hajime didn’t know why the thought of being able to howl made him nervous. Was it the feeling of acting like an animal? He didn’t know, and Ibuki was waiting. 

He sighed. “Alright, alright, fine. I’ll give it a shot.”

He didn’t really know what to do. Did it have to be dark out, so the moon would shine dramatically on him? Did he have to, like, activate some wolf sense or something? Hajime tipped his head back, and tried to just let it come naturally. Sure enough, a cold, intimidating howl erupted from his mouth, echoing through the island like an emergency siren. It was so much louder than he anticipated, but the scariest part was that it felt _good_. He stopped to breathe again.

“Yahoo! That’s awesome Hajime! It sounded like you were about to chase after me! Ibuki totally wants to join in now too!” Ibuki shouted, and when she let out her own, higher pitched howl, Hajime’s body automatically responded, joining her.

‘ _This is so weird,_ ’ he thought to himself. ‘ _But, even so… it is kinda fun._ ’

Though Hajime had stopped himself from joining in on her howls after a bit, Ibuki was having a great time trying to adjust the pitch, saying she wanted to make a song using nothing but wolf howls. It was actually kind of endearing to watch her get so excited about something, despite him being dragged along for the ride.

“Can you two furries knock it off already?!”

Ibuki’s head was tilted up to go one more time, but she stopped, and they turned to see Hiyoko walking back to the motel. She was stopped dead in her tracks, staring at them, gripping a bag in her hands.

“Hiyoko,” Hajime muttered, surprised to see her at all. It had been a couple of days since anyone had seen her, besides probably Kazuichi and Mikan. “What are you doing out? I thought you didn’t trust anybody?”

Hiyoko tsk’d. “I was just told by that rat to grab some anxiety meds from the pharmacy.”

“Anxiety meds?”

Hiyoko’s deer ears flattened against her head, and she turned her head away. “Yeah, the rat said it would be a good idea to take them to stop the fear us prey animals are feeling.” She pointed a finger at the two of them. “You know that fear is caused by you two right?”

“Ibuki didn’t mean to scare people…” she mumbled. 

“Then don’t howl like you’re starting a hunting pack! It’s freaking me out!” Hiyoko started to walk back again, and Ibuki and Hajime stared at each other.

“Someone’s grumpy,” Ibuki mumbled. “I’m gonna go say sorry!” And with that, she bounded off after Hiyoko. Hajime had a bad feeling in his gut, as that restlessness flared up the moment Hiyoko approached them. Running after her, he watched Ibuki wave her hand frantically to get Hiyoko’s attention, and finally ran around in front of her. While normally, even Hiyoko would realize this was just Ibuki being energetic as usual, this time Hiyoko jerked to a stop, letting out a strange squealing noise. 

“W-what are you doing?! You can’t kill me you know! Hajime’s right there, and he’d be a witness!” Hiyoko shrieked. Ibuki cocked her head to the side.

“Why would I want to kill you? I felt super duper duper bad for scaring you, and you ran off before I could apologize!” Ibuki held her hands up to show she meant no harm, but it seemed Hiyoko’s instincts were keeping her from calming down.

“I…” Hiyoko’s eyes darted around. “Just leave me alone already! Your claws look scary, don’t hold them up like that!” And she took off. Hajime put a hand on Ibuki’s shoulder. 

“It’s probably best to not run after her again,” he said. “She’s probably going to go make Mikan and Kazuichi freak out more.”

Ibuki slumped forward. “This sucks. I was hoping at some point that she’d dance to one of my songs, but now she’s acting really weird!”

“I think it’s like how deer freeze when a car is driving towards them on a highway. It’s fear,” Hajime explained, partly to himself, trying to work everything out in his head. “Let’s get back before people think we tried to attack her.”

“At least I learned that you’ve got a reaaalllyyy cool howling voice! Maybe that means you’re secretly a great singer? Hajime, have you been hiding that from me this whole time?!”

‘ _Ever the optimist,_ ’ Hajime thought, but still she did manage to make him smile.


	5. Chapter 5

After saying goodbye to Ibuki, Hajime realized that nagging in his brain had not stopped. In fact, it had worsened. He caught himself staring at the others as he wandered aimlessly around the islands, desperate to quell the unrest. His legs picked up speed, and as soon as he thought he was alone, he let out a frustrated grunt that ended up being a bark, and ran as far as he could for as long as he could. 

Hajime ended up at Chandler Beach. He panted, tongue lolling out of his mouth, staring at the waves of the secluded little area. Nothing helped. It was a primal urge to kill. Hajime knew animals didn’t actually act like this all the time. Animals weren’t bloodthirsty like this; driven to murder anyone or anything within a mile. This was fake. Monokuma had heightened those urges on purpose. It was like being drugged. But knowing all of that didn’t stop it from feeling _frustrating_.

“What is wrong with me?!” Hajime yelled to the ocean. The ocean did not have an answer for him. He sighed, flopping down into the shallow waves brushing up against the shore. “I’m losing my mind…”

He didn’t know how long he laid there on the sand. Distantly, he heard the night time announcement go off. His mind was flooded with the need to hunt. To kill. He shook his head but the urge clouded his entire brain, growling, trying to fight it off. Nothing worked.

Hunt. Kill.

He got up, and followed the scent on his nose. Small. Weak. 

Vulnerable. 

His feet were quiet as he walked towards the source.

Hunt. Kill. Hunt. Kill. Hunt. Kill.

It had it’s back turned away from him. That was perfect. It didn’t even seem to notice. He growled. It turned around to face him. 

Huntkillhuntkill

A small mouse. Easy target. It looked up at him, pupils tiny dots, full of fear. It mouthed something to him. He didn’t know what it said. It was irrelevant anyways.

Huntkillhuntkillhuntkill

It shrieked as he snarled, barking and lunging towards it. It tried to run, but the weak thing tripped, crashing to the concrete. The blood from its scraped legs smelled like ambrosia to him. His teeth could easily tear into its throat.

Huntkillhuntkillhuntkillhuntkill _huntkill_ -

“ _HAJIME STOP!!!”_

Hajime stopped. His eyes came back into focus, and he stared down at Mikan underneath his claws. Her knees were scraped, and her face was wet with tears. He lurched backwards off of her.

“M-Mikan?” he asked, hands shaking.

Mikan stared at him, whimpering quietly. She slowly got to her feet, trembling the entire time, and shook her head. Hajime reached out a hand towards her, but she jerked away.

“D-don’t c-c-come near me!” 

Mikan looked him in the eye.

“I-I-I was right t-to stay away,” she mumbled, and turned around and hobbled away, turning her head around to watch him every few steps, her knees in need of bandages.

Hajime just watched her go.

When she was out of sight, he brought his trembling hands to his face, and sank to the concrete, noticing the patches of blood where her knees collided with the ground. Looking around briefly, he realized he had made it all the way to the third island, and sat in the parking lot of the music venue. He felt something wet hit his own knee. It wasn’t blood, but his own tears.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Well... this IS a danganronpa motive fic afterall......

‘ _I attacked someone. I attacked Mikan. I said I wasn’t going to hurt anybody- I promised it! What the fuck is wrong with my body?!_ ’ His thoughts were scattered. He felt exposed… felt like a murderer.

He climbed to his feet, looking around. He realized he had ended up all the way onto the third island, to the music venue. Hajime didn’t go over there very often, as there wasn’t much of interest to him. The blood staining the concrete of the parking lot made him nauseous. Was that Mikan’s blood? Her knees must have hit the ground pretty hard. Hajime looked down at his hands, his claws staring back up at him. 

There didn’t seem to be any blood on his hands. 

He wiped at his muzzle, his teeth, his face.

No blood.

At least she wasn’t hurt.

Well, not fatally at least.

The still night air was interrupted by a distant piercing shriek, followed by an announcement.

“A body has been discovered! After a certain amount of time has passed, the class trial will begin!”

“What?!” Hajime yelled. A body?! A murder happened?!

Maybe he really did………

“No time to think about that, I need to find everyone!”

With that, Hajime took off. As he ran, his stomach began turning to knots.

A second dinging echoed throughout the island.

“A body has been discovered! ……… I don’t want to say it all again. Good luck!”

His nose picked up the scent of blood, and it led him to the motel. Chiaki, Akane, Sonia- and presumably Gundham, and Nagito were gathered in various areas of the parking lot, near an open room. Mikan was crying, and Kazuichi was curled up against the wall next to the door, mumbling to himself. Fuyuhiko and Nekomaru stepped out, spotting Hajime running over. 

“Where the fuck were you?!” Fuyuhiko shouted, meeting Hajime at the entrance. “I- we were worried you’d become a third fucking victim!”

Hajime paled. “Th-third?” he hesitantly asked.

Chiaki took his hand. “Come see.” Hajime let her pull him into the open door. 

The scent of blood was nearly unbearable, but it was outweighed by the sight of it. The small motel room’s carpet was caked in blood, the comforter as well. Hiyoko lay on the floor, dead. He couldn’t spot any fatal wounds yet, only a couple of slashes on her kimono sleeves. Hajime stepped shakily into the room further. Just when he thought it couldn’t get worse, he spotted Ibuki’s body. Her body limp, a deep wound in her neck. Her empty eyes opened in shock, staring outwards. A knife lay on the ground between them, blood splattered across it.

“Holy shit…”

“We were looking for you after the announcement. We didn’t know if…”

“Yeah…”

Hajime took a deep breath to try and calm himself, but the scent of blood was so strong with his current nose, that it only made him more anxious. Ibuki Mioda and Hiyoko Saionji had been murdered by one of their classmates. One of the people standing within 100 feet of him. Chiaki’s grip on his hand tightened to get his attention, and he looked down at her. 

“We should get started,” she said, “I think.”

“Right.”

“Hold on! You’re getting ahead of yourselves!”

Hajime and Chiaki jumped when Monokuma appeared behind them. He was holding a familiar black tablet. “You didn’t even receive the incredible Monokuma Fi-”

“Hand it over then,” Hajime griped. Monokuma drooped sadly.

“You sure are grumpy tonight,” he whined. “Fine, fine! Take it! I don’t like to reward bad dogs with treats, so this is a one time only thing, okay?!” He tossed the tablets their way, and Chiaki and Hajime opened them up:

“This time the case has two victims: Hiyoko Saionji and Ibuki Mioda. 

The scene of the crime is located inside the Motel on the third island, inside the room belonging to Hiyoko Saionji.

There are multiple wounds across Hiyoko’s entire body. She also appears to have vomited up blood. 

Ibuki Mioda has a deep wound directly above her collarbone. Her body also has multiple small gashes, mainly on her upper arms. 

Estimated time of death is around 9:50pm for both victims.”

As Chiaki and Hajime stared at the files, Monokuma cleared his throat. “Uh, if you’re happy now, I’m just gonna leave-”

“Wait a minute!” Fuyuhiko shouted, running into the room, briefly grimacing at the scene. “Why aren’t we turned back into humans yet?! The murder happened, your motive is over! Put us back to normal!”

Monokuma laughed. “Well I mean, I definitely _could_ do that…”

“So then do it!”

“Hey now! I could just cut to the trial right now if you make me mad! I’m not changing you back yet.”

“It’s because it’s relevant to the case, isn’t it?” Chiaki asked. Monokuma froze. “I’m right, aren’t I?”

“Uhm, well, you see, the thing with that is-” And with that he disappeared. Hajime rolled his eyes. Stupid bear.

“Let’s take note of that, and focus on the case,” she muttered, looking back down at the file. Hajime and Fuyuhiko joined her. “Notice anything strange?” she asked them.

“Now that you mention it, yeah I do,” Fuyuhiko said, eyes widening. “You picking up on this, Hajime?”

“Strange?” Hajime looked down at the file, flipping through the data about the two victims, and the information given. Time of death, locations of wounds, location of the crime… wait. “Oh. There’s no cause of death.”

“It’s odd, don’t you think?” Chiaki asked. “We were given the cause of death for both the two previous trials, but this time it’s the one thing omitted.”

“I guess that means the bastard is hiding it on purpose,” Fuyuhiko grumbled.

“I think figuring that out will lead us to finding out who the killer is,” Hajime said. “I think we need to start gathering clues. You guys ready for this?”

“Yeah.”

He began by taking a look around the room. There was the knife covered in blood, an obvious piece of evidence. Perhaps a bit too obvious? He stowed the thought away for later. Staring down at Hiyoko’s body, he winced. Though she looked like a deer, she was still the same Hiyoko as always… ‘was’ being the key word. Sonia, Gundham, and Nagito stepped into the room as Hajime knelt down next to Hiyoko’s body. Her kimono had several slashes in it, some seemed to cut deep enough to draw blood on her upper arms. There was blood all around her mouth as well; that was probably the blood she vomited up. What could have caused that…?

“Oh!”

His thoughts were interrupted by Nagito leaning down next to his head, picking up a small white bottle near Hiyoko’s body. “I didn’t realize they stocked this here on the island!”

Hajime looked at him. “What is it?”

“They’re pills that I take for anxiety,” he explained, shaking the bottle a bit. “I had no idea they were stocking this on the island! That would have been nice to know days ago.” Nagito unscrewed the cap, tapping a capsule out into his clawed hand. Hajime raised a brow. Nagito took anxiety medication? That was news to him. He always seemed so relaxed. 

However, as he was about to pop the pill into his mouth, he let out a strange yippy scream, dropping the pill to the carpet below. Was that what a fox sounded like?! He sounded like someone being murdered! They both looked down, seeing Gundham release his teeth from Nagito’s foot.

“White-furred Demon! Do not! Do you not remember the words of warning issued not but two days ago?!” Gundham yelled. He snatched the pill, tucking it into his scarf, and crawled up Nagito’s coat, and up all the way onto his muzzle. Nagito’s eyes crossed trying to spot him. “Had you consumed this, your body would see it as forbidden power, and you would surely pay for making such a grave mistake!”

Hajime stood up from Hiyoko’s body, staring at Gundham while trying to avoid making the inappropriate move of laughing at how silly both he and Nagito looked. “What do you mean Gundham?” he asked. 

Gundham let out a… growl? He held up the pill, massive in his small paws. “This kind of medication is toxic to animals! Even most common vitamins can be deadly! I had to save a high level demon from a nasty Sun Ray Capsule once, and it led to me pumping her stomach in my home medical bay!”

There wasn’t time to unpack everything Gundham had just said. There would never be enough time to unpack everything Gundham had just said. However, one thing stuck out through all of the mystical jargon.

“The pills are toxic?” Hajime asked. “This is because we’re part animal now, right?”

“Exactly!” Gundham shouted, nearly falling off of Nagito’s muzzle. Nagito delicately picked him up off of his muzzle by his tiny scarf. 

“I’m going to hand you back to Sonia now,” he said walking over to her. She had her hand to her chin, and seemed to be thinking. She smiled when Nagito held out the hamster to her, and gently put Gundham back in the massive poof of fur around her neck. 

“Thank you very much, Nagito,” she said, patting Gundham on the head. “May I ask you all something?”

The rest of the people in the room looked over to her.

“Why were Hiyoko and Ibuki at this motel in the first place?” she asked. Hajime hadn’t even thought about that in all the chaos. Mikan poked her head through the door.

“W-we were afraid,” she mumbled. Hajime felt his ears drop out of guilt upon seeing her bandaged knees. “I… I don’t know w-why Ibuki is here, but H-Hiyoko, Kazuichi, and I all decided that staying a-at our cottages was a bad idea.”

“You were afraid of being attacked because everyone knew where you slept,” Nagito said. Mikan nodded. She hadn’t looked at Hajime yet. “That seems like a fair assessment, what with how rabid everyone’s been acting.”

Mikan eyed Hajime nervously, and Nagito followed her eye contact. His eyes widened. Hajime realized he had put the pieces together. What surprised him, though, was that Nagito didn’t say anything. Whether that was good or bad would be revealed eventually. Mikan ducked back out of the motel room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> writing investigations is kinda hard but im having a good time.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Concluding the investigation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey I got back from a weekend trip, so now I can post the next chapter! I love Komaeda, but he frightens me sometimes.

Nagito followed Mikan out of the room. Hajime sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. The motel had a clock, which displayed 11:15pm. He was exhausted, and they still had a couple of hours in the trial. 

Next up was Ibuki. Hajime stared down at her lifeless body on the floor, leaning against the shitty motel bed. She had spent time with him that morning, and had specifically tried to cheer him up when he felt like shit, and now she was dead. Murdered. Who would murder someone as nice as Ibuki? That’s what he needed to find out. 

Her head was tilted to the side, revealing a deep bloody wound on the side of her neck. It seemed to have stopped bleeding, at least. Her mouth hung open, tongue lolled out to the side, blood caking her muzzle. Her body was also littered with those same slash marks all over. Was there some sort of knife fight? Who held the knife? 

Mikan and Nagito came back into the room, and approached Ibuki’s body as well.

“S-see?” Mikan asked, gesturing to the wound on Ibuki’s neck. “It’s a deep knife wound.”

Nagito had a hand to his chin, and bent down close. Hajime leaned away. Nagito really had no definition of the term ‘personal space’, huh? He eyed the gash, and then turned to make eye contact with Hajime.

“What do you think, Hajime? Your input would be greatly appreciated,” Nagito asked.

“What are you two talking about?”

“Do you think the knife was the murder weapon?” 

Hajime stared down at the knife laying on the carpet a foot away. It was covered in blood, both the handle and the blade. It was odd to see such an object in here; it felt out of place. The knife didn’t look like a normal kitchen knife, it was long and thin, and looked like it was used for cutting something much stronger than a piece of meat. Hajime looked up at Nagito.

“I mean, maybe? It’s here on the floor of the motel. You’re asking for a reason, though. Why not just trust Mikan? She is a nurse.”

Nagito’s smile curled into a grin. “I suppose you’re right, Hajime! Mikan is the Ultimate Nurse, afterall! If she says it’s a knife wound, then it must be!”

Why did Hajime have the distinct thought that his answer was the wrong one?

Nagito continued to invade Hajime’s personal space, and put a hand on his shoulder. 

“This is really interesting,” Nagito said, leaning in close to Ibuki’s open mouth. Hajime grimaced. There was something quite odd about seeing him so fascinated with one of their classmates' bodies. Nagito thought intensely for a moment.

“What’s interesting?” Hajime asked, hoping that for once Nagito would throw him a bone- poor choice of wording.

“Oh, nothing! Forget I said anything.”

Of course not.

“Well if that’s the case, can you get off of me?” he snapped. He knew that despite Nagito acting like it was nothing, it was probably very important. Nagito’s ears flicked up, and he laughed nervously.

“Oh, my apologies, Hajime! I’ll let you continue your investigation,” he said, standing up. “Besides, I have some things I need to check myself.”

Nagito left, and Hajime’s sinking feeling in his gut only got worse. He was left next to his dead friend and Mikan, who was looking away from him. Hajime wanted to apologize to her, but she wouldn’t even look him in the eye for him to do this subtly. Mikan gripped her arms, and moved away from him. He would apologize later, when everything died down.

Hajime looked around the room, trying to see if he missed anything important. Their lives were on the line, afterall. It was then that he spotted the bathroom at the back of the room. Stepping inside, the scent of blood was just as strong. Inside the sink sat a towel soaked with water and blood. Blood stains also dripped down the edge of the sink, and onto the floor directly in front of it.

‘ _How would blood get in here in the first place?_ ’ Hajime thought, staring down at the mess before him. It looked like… someone had cleaned up after themself. ‘ _But who? And why?_ ’ He knelt down next to the sink, and spotted just one bloody paw-print. 

“Hey Sonia? Can you bring Gundham over here?” Hajime called back into the main room. She perked up, nodding, and heading over to him, her small boyfriend in tow. They too were taken aback by the blood all over the sink.

“W-what can we do for you, Hajime?” Sonia asked, trying to calm herself. Hajime pointed down at the floor in front of where he knelt. 

“See this pawprint?” he asked. “I need to figure out what kind of animal made this.”

Sonia held her arm out, and Gundham ran down, jumping onto Hajime’s shoulder, and then to the floor.

“I fear that I cannot immediately tell,” Gundham muttered, walking around the print, careful to avoid getting himself soaked in the mystery blood. “It will take me a bit, but I can do it. My Dark Queen and I will investigate this. For now, all I can say is that it is not canine.”

“Not canine, huh?” he muttered. That ruled out a lot of the students already. “Well, I’ll get out of your way then.”

“We will let you know if anything arises!” Sonia offered a smile to him.

‘ _Okay, I’m done with this place_ ,’ he thought. Standing, he made his way out of the motel room, grateful to get away from the pungent scent of blood and general shitty motel stench. Looking around, he realized Nagito was gone from the crime scene altogether. 

“Hey, Hajime, question for you.”

He turned to see Akane scratching behind her ear, looking perplexed.

“What is it?” he asked. It wasn’t very often Akane approached him during an investigation.

She cocked her head, squinting in thought. “You feelin’ hungry anymore? Cuz’ I’m not, and that’s weird for me, ya know?”

Hajime stopped. It was true, he wasn’t feeling the surging in the back of his mind anymore. He hadn’t noticed because of the adrenaline that came with staring at the bodies of your friends, but Akane was right. 

“I’m… strangely fine, yeah.”

“Oh, that’s great! I thought I was just goin’ crazy!” Akane grinned. “I kept tryin’ to tell Kazuichi that I don’t wanna hurt him anymore, but he won’t believe me!” 

Hajime glanced over toward the motel again. Kazuichi was still whimpering just outside the door, sitting against the wall. Making his way over to him, Hajime watched as his ‘Soul Bro’ flinched at the sight of him.

“What’s got you so freaked out, man?” Hajime asked, trying to sound casual in an attempt to make Kazuichi calm down.

“D-don’t get near me! I know that hyena chick was lying!” he shrieked, and Hajime sighed, frustrated. “First I see a murder scene, and now I’m surrounded by killers?!”

Hajime cocked his head. “I thought you’d been hiding out here the whole time. You’ve been in the motel room?” he asked. Kazuichi nodded his head rapidly.

“Yeah, man, it was awful! I heard a bunch of thumps and thuds and noises, and I was so scared to come out that I waited until it settled down. Then, I got up and left my room, and came next door here. I knocked and knocked and knocked, but nobody answered!” he rambled. Hajime listened, and had a thought.

“So how did you get in?”

Kazuichi looked up at him finally. “That’s the thing!” he exclaimed. “The door was unlocked! I just walked right in no problem!”

The door was unlocked? Hajime put a hand on his hip, thinking. “I thought you all were really paranoid, though. Having the door unlocked doesn’t make sense if Hiyoko was scared of being murdered.”

Kazuichi threw his hands up. “Look, that’s what happened! I don’t know either.” Kazuichi seemed to remember he was supposed to be afraid of him, and shrunk back up. “Now get out of here, first that creepy fox and now you? Weirdo said he was headed to the hospital. So creepy….”

Creepy fox? That must have been Nagito’s next destination to check. 

He left the motel, walking through the cool night air. His new eyes were much better at seeing in the dark than his old ones. There was a light on in the hospital, and Hajime thought about how it felt like approaching the scene of a horror film. He hadn’t been in the hospital yet, there was no need to when there was a functioning pharmacy, and Mikan seemed to wear bandages around her arms for convenience… maybe? He didn’t really know. He carefully made his way through the dimly lit hall, cringing at the strange dioramas set up to his right. The light source was coming from the room at the end of the hall.

Stepping inside, he saw Nagito leaning over a cart, looking at a tray of medical tools, humming to himself in thought.

“Nagito?” Hajime asked. Nagito jumped, yipping loudly, causing Hajime to let out his own scared bark.

“Aha, sorry Hajime! You scared me! I didn’t know you were in here,” Nagito said, laughing at his own fear.

“You scared me! What are you even doing in here?” Hajime shot back. Nagito looked down at the tray, and then back up at Hajime.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Nagito asked. “I’m matching the knife used in the murder.”

The knife from the murder? That strange, thin knife that made Hajime much more nervous than usual? Hajime stepped over to the cart, peering down at the surgical tools. There were a few scalpels, a bone saw that made his skin crawl, and a few other tools he recognized. But from there, he noticed that they seemed to get a bit odder. There were multiple scissors that seemed too large to be used for surgery, and a long row of knives labeled “Amputation Knives.” 

“Amputation knives?” Hajime mumbled, staring down at them. They were similar to the knife at the crime scene; the long thin blade reflecting his face back.

“These aren’t used in general surgeries,” Nagito explained. “I’ve read that they were used back in the 1700’s quite a bit, though, since amputations were probably far more common.”

Hajime wasn’t going to explain how this knowledge only made him more wary of the blades in front of him. “So you think the knife came from here?” he asked, pulling Nagito away from spilling more creepy facts.

“Well, if you line them up next to each other, they do look exceedingly similar, don’t you think?”

“That’s true…”

They made their way out of the hospital, and walked back to the motel in silence. Heading into the parking lot, he saw Chiaki looking around. When she spotted him, her ears flicked up, and she approached them. 

“Where’d you go?” she asked. “We turned around and suddenly you weren’t in the room anymore.”

Oh that’s right. He hadn’t really told anyone that he left for the hospital. “I was following after Nagito-” he gestured towards the fox in question… and he was gone. He had stepped back into the motel room. “That hospital is spooky after dark. He found some useful information, though, so I guess it was the right idea. Now he can’t hide it during the trial.”

“Speaking of disappearing,” she said quietly. “Where were you before the murder, Hajime? You ran from the opposite side of the island.”

Ah. He was so caught up in the investigation that he forgot about the attack for a moment. He supposed it was probably best to tell her, even if he did feel exceedingly guilty over it. But Chiaki was his friend, she would understand, right?

“W-well, the reason that I… the reason I was already on the island was because-”

He was interrupted by the intercom bell.

“Time’s up! If you don’t know where to meet by now, I guess you really haven’t been paying attention. Come on, let’s get this show on the road!”

Gasps rang out from all around him. Time was up already?! He still hadn’t figured out who the killer was yet, and now their lives were about to be at stake over it. 

“Chiaki, I-”

She put a hand up. “It’s okay, I trust you.”

Despite her reassurance, the guilt and fear in his chest remained.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trial: Start!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey sorry for taking a few days! I was focusing on some classes, but here's part 1 of the trial! I'm still having such a good time with this!
> 
> Also thank you for the lovely fanart!: https://irilumina.tumblr.com/post/628892659545784320/oh-my-god-theyre-so-cute-i-love-them
> 
> If anyone has any fanart they'd like to send me, @ irilumina is my tumblr! Or, you can link it in a comment below! Y'all are so nice ;-;

The walk to the trial ground was silent, save for a few nervous mumbles and people reassuring each other. Hajime spent the entire trek rethinking over all of the evidence gathered from the investigation. 

Points could be connected together, but would that be enough to find the murderer?

The murderer. 

Hidden amongst them right now. 

Someone within five feet of him took the lives of not one, but two people. Part of him wanted to start looking around, seeing if he could spot anyone looking even more nervous, but he couldn’t bring himself to. It was impossible to judge someone as a killer based on fearful body language, especially when the consequences of guessing wrong struck fear into him.

“It’ll be okay,” he heard Chiaki mumble, tugging on his hand and leading him into the elevator.

The elevator was just as cold as always, but Chiaki’s hand added a bit of warmth to keep him grounded. The elevator clacked as it descended down into the depths, and the few people who had been talking on the way over had gone silent. When it finally stopped, and the doors opened, they all gasped.

The trial ground looked like it had been swallowed up by trees. The walls had been decorated to look like a forest, and vines hung down all around the podiums, framing it like a clearing. 

Hanging from a vine in the back of the trial ground was a familiar face.

“Monomi?!”

The pink rabbit had been suspended from vines instead of rope this time, and was asleep. She shot awake and began frantically wriggling to get out of the vines.

“Oh! Hello everyone! It has been quite a while since we’ve seen each other!”

Sonia looked distressed. “Where have you been?!”

Kazuichi smacked his hand against his face. “Man, I thought someone was missin’, but I just figured it was because Gundham’s so damn small.”

Monomi’s ears drooped a bit. “You all didn’t even realize I was gone?”

Chiaki let go of Hajime’s hand, and went over to her spot at the trial ground. “Don’t worry, we’ll untie you when this is over.”

Everyone made their way to their spots, but Sonia stopped, holding Gundham and looking at his podium.

“Uhm, how is Gundham supposed to participate in the class trial?”

“Great question!”

There’s the bastard.

Monokuma hopped to life, and pulled a contraption out of seemingly nowhere. Rigging it to Gundham’s podium, it gave him a small platform to stand on, giving him a way to participate. “I had contemplated on giving the hamsters these when we first started, but I decided against it. That’d be twenty people! And hamsters aren't people.”

Gundham huffed at that last statement, but climbed onto the platform anyways. Sonia gave him a little pat, and he threw her what may have been a thumbs up? Hajime couldn’t tell from his spot due to… Hiyoko’s portrait blocking him.

“Alrighty then! Let’s get started!” Monokuma sat on his throne, rubbing his paws together excitedly. “I can’t wait for this one!”

Was he prepared? If each part of the evidence gathered was a bullet, Hajime felt like he had a loaded gun. But the question was, who would he be shooting with it?

“Well then, let me first ask you all: what did you think of my amazing motive?” Monokuma leaned forward in his chair.

“It sucked!” Kazuichi immediately snapped. “Everything was a blur of fear and panic the entire time!”

“Everything’s always a blur of fear and panic for you, Kazuichi, so you should have been used to it,” Fuyuhiko griped, his tail swishing. 

“I still do not see why we have to remain as animals during the trial,” Sonia said. She had a point. There was no real reason to keep them as animals during the trial. The motive had already served its purpose.

“Yeah I asked that earlier during the investigation,” Fuyuhiko replied. “He didn’t give an answer, but Chiaki clocked onto him and said it probably has something to do with the murder.”

“Well, let us go over the effects of the motive itself then. Perhaps then we will have a starting point to this trial.”

The effects of the motive, huh? Well, it wasn’t just one type of effect, there were a few of them. Hajime thought for a bit, trying to recall each of them.

“Let’s see,” he began. “There was the desire to kill that affected everyone who had become a predator. That caused us to get antsy whenever we were around anyone who wasn’t also a predator. However, those who became prey animals began feeling a slowly intensifying fear whenever they were around us.”

“That’s not all,” Akane chimed in. “We couldn’t eat, like, half the food we normally eat! Gundham said it was all toxic! I practically starved dealing with that part!”

“What, do you only eat garlic, avocados, and onions?” Kazuichi asked sarcastically.

“Well, no, but think about how much stuff has onions and garlic in it!”

“Avocados are incredibly good for your health as well! I could feel myself waning without them!” Nekomaru added helpfully.

“Exactly! Food’s fuel afterall!!”

‘ _Guys, this is not the time for that_ ,’ Hajime wanted to say desperately.

“Turning the students against each other, forcing them to fight, I can’t believe you would pull such a horrible trick on them!” Monomi yelled at Monokuma. “Look at them all! I haven’t been able to see anyone this whole time, and now seeing them all acting like animals… it makes a teacher feel awful for her class!”

“Aw shut up, I still had one pink bunny watching over the class!” Monokuma laughed. Was that some kind of weird inside joke?

“Anyways, we’re getting off track,” Nagito spoke up, bringing their attention back to the case. “Hiyoko Saionji was turned into a prey animal, correct? She hid away from the rest of the class the moment the motive took effect. Kazuichi, Mikan, how did you two also end up staying with her?”

Mikan threaded her hands through her own hair, combing it to soothe herself. “W-well, when Kazuichi and I left the restaurant, we went to h-her cabin. When she wasn’t there, w-we thought about where someone could sleep that was as far away as possible. We were planning on checking the hospital o-out, but stumbled across Hiyoko coming out of her motel room. I-it just happened after that.”

“So nobody else knew that you all were staying at the motel?” Nagito pushed on.

Everyone else looked at each other. Nobody seemed to have known this. “Nope, it was just us,” Kazuichi said. “Nekomaru was always with Akane, so we couldn’t get close enough to talk. We didn’t tell Chiaki, ‘cause she’s always hangin’ out with Hajime, and we didn’t want her to go blabbing about it.”

Hajime sputtered, but Chiaki seemed unfazed. “Do you really think I’d put you in danger, Kazuichi?” she asked. Kazuichi flinched, looking away and laughing forcefully.

“Hey speaking of Hajime, where were you? We checked your cabin after Kazuichi and Mikan came running, and you weren’t there,” Fuyuhiko said. Hajime remembered Mikan’s scared face, and cringed.

“I’m telling you, it’s because he’s the one who did it! Look at him!” Kazuichi suddenly shifted from poking fun at Chiaki to full on blaming Hajime. 

“What?” Hajime snapped. “You think I’m the killer?!”

Hajime watched Nagito shift across from him, and knew whatever came next would be bad.

“He does have a point,” Nagito infuriatingly added. “You even came running from across the third island. You were already there before the body announcement went off.”

Eyes immediately landed on him. 

“That’s true.”

“It is a bit suspicious, though I loathe to think of it at all.”

“See! I told you!”

“I didn’t kill Ibuki or Hiyoko! Why are you accusing me?!” It was insane! He wasn’t the killer! But admitting to why he was over on the island was equally shameful. He knew he had to explain himself, though.

“I know where Hajime was.”

Mikan was staring right at him. “I know exactly where Hajime was.”

Nagito leaned against his podium. “Then do enlighten us. Where exactly was Hajime during the time of the murder?” That bastard knew exactly what he was doing! Hajime the thought that, if Nagito was leading everyone down this path… he knew Hajime wasn’t the killer. The look in his eyes, something about it. He knew.

“I know where he was… because he attacked me.” Gasps rang out. “He tracked me down and jumped me in the parking lot of the music venue! I was so afraid! I thought he was going to k-kill me!”

“I didn’t m-”

Mikan continued. “He was on the island! I ran, and tripped, and he nearly bit into me! How do we know he’s not the killer?!” 

Her shrieking stirred fear into his classmates, who looked at him in horror. As she spoke, Hajime’s eyes fell onto Chiaki, who stared right back, confident as ever.

Nekomaru stared him down. “Hajime… is this true?”

Fuyuhiko looked just as concerned. “Did you… really do something like that?”

“I… yes it’s true.” He said. “But I didn’t kill Ibuki or Hiyoko! I was on Chandler Beach, freaking out over this stupid urge to kill. I laid there for a while, and heard the nighttime announcement go off. Finally it just… took over by force. I don’t even remember how I got all the way over there from the second island.” Hajime stared at Mikan sadly. “Mikan, I kept trying to apologize to you, but you kept running away whenever we made eye contact.” Mikan avoided his eyes, her whiskers twitching. “I am sorry for making you fall and hurt your knees, and for nearly hurting you more. That’s not the kind of person I am.”

As he finished, he looked around at his friends. The shock was clear on their faces. Everyone knew it was possible to fall victim to the motive’s effects, but it felt like of all people, Hajime should have been immune.

“And how are we supposed to believe anything you just said?” Kazuichi yelled. “We’ve seen killers hide their real feelings before, why should we trust anything you just said?!”

Hajime balked. “Do you really think I’d lie right now?!”

“How are we supposed to know?! You’re the one who fucking attacked someone!”

"Attacking a girl, Hajime?" Nagito asked. "Not cool."

“Wait,” Chiaki said. “When were the times of death again?”

The times of death? How was that relevant?

“What are you talking about? Why are you bringing that up now?” Fuyuhiko asked.

“Because… Hajime isn’t the killer… probably.”

He just stared at Chiaki. Her unwavering support was reassuring, despite second guessing herself at the end. He hadn’t seen her this forward in a trial before, and something about her tone made him inclined to trust her.

“Let’s see… the time of death for both of them was around 9:50 I think.” As Fuyuhiko spoke, they pulled out their files, and each checked to confirm that, yes, the time of death was as he said.

“Ah, I see what you mean!” Sonia gasped. “Hajime, did you not say you heard the nighttime announcement go off whilst you were at Chandler Beach?”

Hajime’s eyes lit up. “Yeah, I did! I heard it go off while I was still on the second island!”

“So then there is no possible way for the fiend to have commited the crime!” Gundham yelled. “Excellent! This is remarkable news!”

“I knew you couldn’t have killed anyone, Hajime,” Akane said, her clawed hand on her hip. “You’re way too nice to hurt anyone.”

“He still attacked Mikan though!” Kazuichi continued. “He’s dangerous!”

“He’s no more dangerous than a hyperactive puppy!” Nekomaru shouted. That was… nice of him? Maybe? Mikan went silent, ears flat, clenching her tail in her hands.

“We spent all that time arguing about whether or not Hajime was the killer, and it wasn’t even relevant to the case! This was one big circle!” Fuyuhiko said, clearly annoyed.

“Let’s focus on what we know about the crime scene then,” Hajime said. He was relieved to be able to get back to work on the case.

“What about Ibuki?” Akane asked.

“What about her?”

“Well, Ibuki was in the same room as Hiyoko, and there was that knife layin’ there on the ground. Maybe they duked it out, or maybe Ibuki went crazy!”

Hajime’s ears flattened as he thought hard. “No… I don’t think so. There would be marks that signified Ibuki went feral.”

“Oh, like bite marks?” Chiaki asked.

“Yeah, bite marks, or any kind of claw mark.”

“I hate to bring this up again so soon, but it may help us cement this point,” Sonia spoke up. “Hajime, when your body tried to attack Mikan, did you feel any urge to use a weapon of some kind?”

Hajime flinched, but answered nonetheless. “Not at all, my mind just went… blank, and when I came too it was just Mikan and me in the music venue parking lot.”

“The culprit had their wits about them then… how sinister!” Gundham added very helpfully.

“So the knife then,” Fuyuhiko chimed in. “Is that the murder weapon? It seems like there’s enough evidence pointing to it, with all the slashes on their clothes.”

“Not so!” Gundham flailed his small hamster arms in the air. “Not for the stag of nightmares! It seems she was not killed in such a physical manner! This was the work of evil science!”

What the hell was he talking about now?

“What do you mean, Gundham?” Hajime asked.

“I think,” Chiaki translated Gundham’s words for him, “he means that at least Hiyoko’s death wasn’t caused by the knife.”

That’s right. Hiyoko’s death couldn’t have been the knife. Her wounds seemed superficial, almost as if they had been sliced after she was already dead or dying. 

“It was the pills that killed her then, right?” Hajime asked. “What kind of pills even were those?”

“Ah,” Mikan finally spoke up. “T-they’re a-anxiety pills. That specific kind of drug is prescription-only, so y-you have to talk to a doctor about it.”

Oh yeah, Nagito mentioned that he normally takes those pills for anxiety. 

“It sure would have been nice to have taken those when I found them, but a certain little rodent used his talent to save my life!” Nagito perked up.

“If the white demon were to have taken such a drug, his body would not have been able to handle it, and it would have been as bad as poisoning yourself!” Gundham paced his small platform. “My job requires me to know as much as I can about veterinary practices, so it is imperative I know which medicines my Devas can take.”

Hajime thought back to the crime scene. Her mouth splattered with the blood she had vomited up, her face lying in it… he shuddered at the memory. There was no doubt about it, the medication had killed her.

“Well, if Ibuki did not go crazy, and Hiyoko was not stabbed, then… what if it was a double suicide?” Sonia asked.

“I don’t think it was a double suicide,” Nagito muttered. “I think, before we continue, I’d like to ask a few questions to someone in particular.” His eyes scanned the room, before falling on his victim. Her eyes widened in fear as they locked with Nagito’s, his fox features making him look like he was about to pounce. “Mikan? Can I ask you some things?”


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trial complete.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh lawd we really in it now boys.

Mikan trembled at her podium, her eyes trying to look away from Nagito, but always darting back. “Q-questions?” she asked timidly. “About what?”

“Well,” Nagito began. “It’s about the wound on Ibuki’s neck.” Hajime watched as he interrogated Mikan. He knew by now where this was going; Nagito was leading her somewhere.

“T-the knife wound? W-what about the wound?”

Nagito held up one of the knives from the hospital, and Kazuichi shrieked. “Do you know what kind of knife this is?”

Mikan looked over at the knife. “I-It’s an amputation knife.”

“And this is the same type of knife found at the crime scene, correct?”

Mikan nodded.

“I don’t think this type of knife could have caused the type of wound on Ibuki’s neck,” he said, holding it up and turning it in his hand. “The type of weapon needed for that would have been much shorter.”

Hajime felt like it was time to interject. “What are you getting at Nagito?”

Nagito met his eyes. “What I’m saying is that this knife was planted.”

“What?!” Fuyuhiko shouted. “So what you’re saying is that this is some kinda red herring?!”

“That would make sense,” Chiaki said. “The wounds on both of their bodies seemed very superficial, almost harmless in places. The killer must have used a different weapon… probably.”

A different weapon? The only other ‘weapon’ there was the pills. Hajime couldn’t think of any other possibility for it. 

“What other possibility is there?” Sonia asked, voicing Hajime’s own concerns. 

“We’re forgetting something important about this motive,” Nagito said.

‘ _ Forgetting something, huh… _ ,’ Hajime thought. 

“Is it the fact we can’t eat certain things?”

“No, we already went over that earlier, that’s how Hiyoko died. It’s gotta be another part of us.”

“Maybe someone stored a weapon on their body! Like hiding it in a pouch like a kangaroo!”

“Nobody’s a kangaroo!”

“Wait!” Hajime butted in.

Fuyuhiko gawked at him. “Are you gonna argue someone’s a kangaroo?”

“No,” he continued, “what Akane said about hiding a weapon on their person.”

Kazuichi stuttered. “T-they just kept the weapon with em’?! Are they holding a weapon right now?! Hey, killer! Take out the real murder weapon!”

Nobody moved to convict themself. Hajime rolled his eyes.

“We’re animals right now. We don’t need to use external weapons.” Hajime held out his hand, showing the sharp claws that tipped his fingers. “Each of us has some sort of self defense mechanism, just from the anatomy of the creatures we’ve become.”

“Why don’t we go through what everyone has,” Chiaki said. “I’ll go first. I don’t really have much, but I do have this set of teeth in front,” she opened her mouth to show off a set of teeth similar to rodents, “Rabbits also are known to have really strong kicks, but I haven’t really tried that out. I… think that’s it for me.”

Everyone looked at each other. Nagito smiled. “I suppose I can go next, if everyone needs a push forward!” He slumped a bit. “Though, despite being classified as being a predator, I don’t have much to offer. Foxes rely on the magnetic fields of the earth to detect where their prey is, and use their sharp teeth to kill. While this body does possess claws, I don’t think they could do much compared to someone like Hajime or Fuyuhiko.”

‘ _ Way to downplay the fact he just said he relied on the magnetic pull of the earth like it was the most boring and useless thing in the world _ ,’ Hajime thought.

Gundham didn’t have much way of killing in the first place, so he was allowed to skip. Kazuichi laughed and avoided mentioning the key part of being a skunk, and Nekomaru flashed his tusks and laughed. Akane was similar to Hajime, as was Sonia.

Fuyuhiko laughed sarcastically, holding up his claws. “Do I even need to explain how a tiger kills?” Hajime couldn’t blame him. He was basically the apex of the entire group, though everyone knew Fuyuhiko would have probably told everyone the moment he tried to hurt anybody. The last person was Mikan.

“W-well,” Mikan started. “I d-don’t even know how I could attack anybody. M-m-mice are k-kind of the biggest prey animal of all time.” 

“Yeah, but we’re all showing off our abilities anyways,” Kazuichi grumbled. “If it makes ya’ feel any better, I talked about everything my body could do, so we’re in the same boat.”

Despite his blatant lie about mentioning absolutely everything, Kazuichi was being strangely nice to Mikan. Hajime wondered if they bonded during their time hiding from the rest of the group. It was a tad bit endearing seeing him try to reassure someone. But quickly, that feeling was pushed aside, as Mikan continued. 

“It’s no use,” she said, voice perfectly calm this time. “There’s just no way I could have done anything.”

“We know that, Mikan, we’re just trying to lay everything out just in cas-” Hajime’s words were cut off.

“That sounds like you still think there’s a possibility of me killing Hiyoko and Ibuki.”

“W-what?”

Mikan looked him dead in the eye. “It’s just completely incorrect, though. You probably committed the murder anyways, since you violently attacked me and all.” Hajime flinched.

Sonia spoke up. “Mikan, I believe we have already established that Hajime is not the killer-”

“But it’s sooo much more believable right?” Mikan was frowning at Nagito now. “And you decided to try and lead the entire trial down this path, all because you think  _ I _ committed the murders?”

Nagito looked right back at her. “You still haven’t given us your answer, by the way.”

“Is it even important what my answer is?”

“You know it is.”

“But I’m not even worth the time of day, my abilities are frail, and could easily be overpowered. I can’t believe you all are cornering me like this, I didn’t even do anything wrong!”

“Mikan,” Chiaki cut in, causing both to pause. “Rabbit’s aren’t rodents, but we’re similar. You should have teeth like I do… probably. They are a little silly looking, that’s true, but if you’re embarrassed about them… don’t be, because we’re in the same boat, like Kazuichi said.”

Mikan stared at Chiaki, her eyes dead inside. It startled Hajime, seeing Mikan so… collected. Why was she acting like that? It only made him more suspicious of her, and Hajime felt  _ bad _ being suspicious of Mikan, especially after he attacked her. 

“You too?” Mikan asked Chiaki. “N-now you’re also saying I’m the killer?”

“If you’re not the killer, then give us something- anything to convince us otherwise!” Hajime said. “We don’t want to suspect you as a murderer. Help us believe you.”

“Where’s your proof I  _ did _ commit the murder?” Mikan was gripping her tail violently, her claws digging into it. She looked around at everyone, back and forth, locking eyes with everyone as she did so. “You need to have proof, you know. Why can’t you just forgive me, already, and we can go back to figuring out w-who really killed them.”

Chiaki looked over at Hajime. “You have proof, don’t you?” she asked, not as an accusation, but a prompting.

Hajime sighed. “There’s one final part of this case I never confirmed.”

Everyone’s eyes widened. Hajime knew that whatever the answer was for his next question would be the deciding factor on whether or not Mikan was the killer. He felt awful, like a murderer himself for having to stare Mikan down and corner her like this, but there was no other way to do it.

“Gundham,” Hajime asked. Said hamster turned to look at him. His eyes, already usually harboring a grave expression, looked even more concerned. “You know what I’m about to ask you, right?”

“I do know, yes,” he replied. “During the investigation, I was approached by the Hellhound to conduct research into a relic of another demon. It was a mark left by the killer on the floor of the motel bathroom. A calling card of death. He could not decipher the origins of the mark, but due to my powers of working with the animal kingdom, I learned the truth.” Hajime felt the dread piling up inside of him. “The print was blotchy, and hard to decipher, but I have dealt with far less revealing marks. It was abundantly clear: the print belonged to a mouse.”

Gasps rang out. 

Sonia took a shaky breath. “When Gundham told me that he suspected the print belonged to a mouse, I argued with him! I did not want to believe it!” Her fluffy tail hung low. “But it was obvious that Gundham knew enough about animals, that there was no way for him to be incorrect.”

“So that means…” Fuyuhiko mumbled, shocked.

Nagito grinned. “As expected of the Ultimate Breeder. Even when shrunk down to less than a foot in height, he still managed to shine, bringing in the final piece of evidence to this trial.”

“It all makes sense now,” Hajime began. “I don’t think this started out as a murder, but a friend trying to help. The people in the group who became animals of prey were feeling a growing anxiety throughout the past few days. Hiyoko was one of them. Mikan, wanting to help, used her ability as a nurse to prescribe Hiyoko some anxiety meds. That was when Ibuki and I saw Hiyoko walking by with a bag from the pharmacy, back to the motel. Ibuki felt bad for startling Hiyoko, and had attempted to apologize to her, but Hiyoko wouldn’t listen.

That evening, Mikan and Hiyoko were in the same motel room, Mikan most likely wanting to assist her in making sure the dosage was correct, and teaching her how to take the meds. This was why the door was unlocked. But, due to our current bodies not being able to handle strong medication prescribed to humans, it poisoned her instead. Hiyoko coughed up blood, and started dying. Ibuki probably still felt bad about making Hiyoko even more scared than normal, and followed after Hiyoko to apologize to her. But instead, she walked into an accidental murder scene. Mikan, who now had a witness to a crime she didn’t mean to commit, had to get rid of her. The wound on her neck wasn’t a knife wound, but Mikan’s long rodent teeth. That’s why she was so adamant about not telling us. She went into the bathroom, and washed off the blood on her face and body, and began trying to find a way to cover up her involvement. Mikan ran to the nearest place she could find a weapon: the hospital, and grabbed an amputation knife from the back room. She hurried back, and sliced wounds onto Ibuki and Hiyoko’s body, clumsily trying to make it look as if a fight broke out between them. She ran from the scene, but was caught by me when I was overcome by the motive’s fabricated urges to kill. From there… we know what happened.” 

Hajime, baffled and confused and angry, put all of that aside. “Mikan, what do you have to say about this?”

Mikan’s eyes went blank. She stood, frozen, staring off into space. The rest of the class looked at her, hoping she would break the silence. Hajime felt something vile bubbling up in the room. A dark feeling he didn’t want to think about. It crept in like a thick tar slowly flooding everything around them, pulling them all into it.

Then, Mikan started to laugh. A giggle that started small, but quickly intensified; a manic laugh she had never let out before. 

“W-what is she doing?” Fuyuhiko asked. “Is she insane?!”

“Mikan?” Chiaki prompted.

“Hahaha!” she continued to giggle, her personality turning giddy. “I… you all… you cornered me, and called me a murderer, and sentenced me to death! I haven’t… felt this in so long…”

Hajime jerked his head around, trying to see if everyone was just as freaked out as he was. Nagito had a visceral glare on his face, grimacing at the words she said. 

“...Felt what?” Hajime asked, terrified of the answer.

“You don’t know? You haven’t figured it out yet?” she asked, her words little knives slicing into him. “This feeling… It’s heartbreaking… this despair…”

“M-Mikan?!” Sonia cried out.

“Hold the phone!” Monokuma interrupted. “I feel like this trial has come to an end! I think it’s time we moved on to… voting tiiime! Please pull the lever in front of you, and cast your vote for who you believe the Blackened is!”

As everyone cast their votes, Mikan continued to laugh to herself. Once the levers were all pulled, the screen lit up with the results.

It was unanimous. 

And it was correct.

Mikan Tsumiki was the killer of Hiyoko Saionji, and Ibuki Mioda.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so glad everyone likes this fic it makes my heart swell! I love the fanart and fanworks everyone is writing for it! Y'all make me so happy ;u;


End file.
